BJP pres­i­dent’s new team to aim for re­gional bal­ance

NEW DELHI: Bharatiya Janata Party chief Amit Shah will an­nounce his new team be­fore the party’s con­clave here on March 19-20. Hav­ing got a sec­ond chance on Jan­uary 24 to lead the party — for a full three-year term — Shah is dis­cussing his team with Prime Min­is­ter Naren­dra Modi and RSS rep­re­sen­ta­tives in the BJP.

The team of na­tional of­fice bear­ers in­cludes a max­i­mum of 13 vice pres­i­dent, nine gen­eral sec­re­taries and 15 gen­eral sec­re­taries. “An an­nounce­ment of the team is ex­pected by the sec­ond week of March. New faces will be in­ducted,” a source told HT.

“Two of them could be dropped,” said a party source privy to the de­lib­er­a­tion. A Sched­uled Caste leader could also be in­ducted as gen­eral sec­re­tary. This com­mu­nity does not have rep­re­sen­ta­tion in the cur­rent team.

Ex­cept for Pandey and Vi­jayavargiya, none of the gen­eral sec­re­taries have con­tested a di­rect elec­tion. Ya­dav is a mem­ber of the Ra­jya Sabha.

A cou­ple of lead­ers from states with a cer­tain mass base are also ex­pected to find place. For­mer Kar­nataka deputy CM R Ashok and for­mer Jharkhand CM Ar­jun Munda are prob­a­bles for get­ting a na­tional as­sign­ment.

BJP’S youth wing, cur­rently led by three-time Lok Sabha MP Anurag Thakur, is likely to get a new head. Given the as­sign­ment in 2010, 41-year-old Thakur is the long­est serv­ing chief of the Yuva Mor­cha and is tipped for a pro­mo­tion within the or­gan­i­sa­tion.

Sources claimed that Shah may leave some posts va­cant for fu­ture re­quire­ments that may arise fol­low­ing an im­pend­ing reshuffle of the cabi­net af­ter the Par­lia­ment’s Bud­get ses­sion.

While Union min­is­ter Sar­bananda Sonowal has al­ready been sent to As­sam as pres­i­dent of the state BJP, ju­nior rail­way min­is­ter Manoj Sinha is in con­tention to head the party in Ut­tar Pradesh.